Hargreaves Lansdown named as slowest provider for pension transfers

Hargreaves Lansdown has been named as the provider with the slowest pension transfers that uses the Origo Transfer Service for the third time.

In its latest Origo Transfer Index report, Origo revealed that the average ceding performance for Hargreaves Lansdown was 30.2 days in the past year.

The firm also had the slowest published transfer times the previous two Origo reports in March and June 2019.

By comparison, Yorsipp Limited and Liberty Sipp were the second and third slowest, with average transfer times of 27.6 days and 23.6 days respectively.

Commenting on the results, Hargreaves Lansdown head of policy, Tom McPhail, said that others with slower transfers were not willing to have their performances published.

He stated: “We believe transparency of performance is important, which is why Hargreaves Lansdown agrees to the publication of our data by Origo, where others with poorer numbers do not.

“We are also pleased that our performance is improving; we’re putting a lot of resources into ensuring we execute all instructions in a timely manner.

“We are fully committed to the Star initiative and will keep working to get all pension providers complying with the industry agreed standards.”

‘Simpler’ transfers were found to make up 67.2 per cent of Hargreaves Lansdown’s switches, the fourth lowest on the list of 28 providers, and had an average ceding performance of 32.9 days.

NFU Mutual was found to be the quickest provider, with an average of 4.9 days, followed by Canada Life and MetLife, which averaged 5.1 and 5.8 days respectively.

NFU Mutual senior pensions expert, Richard Needham, commented: “We’re pleased to be named one of the best providers of this service. We always aim to meet the needs of our members as swiftly as possible while keeping up the high standards we are known for.

“However, we would stress that it’s important to take advice before making any changes to a pension, because it can greatly affect your financial future.”

Origo’s index found that the average overall ceding time declined to 8.9 days as of 30 September 2019, from 9.3 days in March 2019.

Origo managing director, Anthony Rafferty, commented: “The continuing increases are primarily due to a rise of transfer volumes across the Origo Transfer Service community alongside new companies, such as Nest, signing up to the Transfer Service. There are now over 100 brands using the service.

“The service provides the benefit of automation of the transfer process with immediate efficiencies of creating a faster, safer outcomes for individuals and cost and resource savings for providers and administrators.”